Absolutely, I realize that. But Fury is still nice for protecting the little spear-armed blighters who would be scurrying up to support the Hunter Orcs, I suppose.

My concern with Druzhag is that he's rather expensive and slow, and while he can buff the Wargs very nicely, he really wants some Giant Spiders and/or Bat Swarms, which eat into his 200 point allowance quite a lot. Effectively, I can take him but I wouldn't be able to take him and a Troll, I don't think.

Unless I just went for something like this:

Druzhag
Cave Troll
6 Moria Goblin Warriors with Spears

[Edit]Or another idea, to get Fury on the Orcs.
Mordor Orc Shaman
Mordor Troll
8 Orc Warriors with Spears

Again, provides support and a heavy hitter and helps to keep the squishy Hunter Orcs up and running.

The second option i sbetter. The one with the Orc Shaman and spears.

I don't understand how you cna compalin about taking 2-handed weapons when you were taking mtd hunter orc archers which are considerably worse. With the attcks that they get, and used in conjunction with a model using a hand-weapon you should be fine, especially since they can now be supported by spears. Even if youre mad enough to prefer bows, at lesat give them to the infantry

Other than that, and the fact that mt hunter orcs still aren't worth it in those numbers, you are fine with that, though it depends who you come up against. What enemies are you likely to be playing?

_________________
"I am the Flying Spagetti Monster. Thou shall have no other monsters before me"
-FSM.

Agreed, although I'm even more likely to go Angmar and take an Orc Shaman, Cave Troll, and more spears.



Under no circumstances did I complain about taking two-handed weapons. I stated that I did not rate them. Very different terms there, with a host of connotations.

The reason I do not like two-handers is simple: you pay a premium to make a warrior worse at its job. Being able to hit harder is of no value if you cannot win a fight. And rolling all the dice in the world won't help you if your opponent rolls a 6, or has a higher fight and rolls a 5. Just not odds I'm willing to pay extra for.

The bows, on the other hand, have a particular use that is tangential enough for me not to want to spend a lot of points on them, but that could come up often enough for me to not care about "wasting" three points. They don't hurt the already amazing offensive power of the Hunters on Wargs (again, double that of a Hunter Orc, or quadruple that of a Fell Warg on a charge), but there are situations where it would be nice to have the opportunity to take a shot. I predict far less times that I would want to move a Hunter Orc on foot 3" to take a shot.



We're going to have to agree to disagree on the Mounted Hunters, which is fine. As far as opponents, I have absolutely no idea and no desire at all to game my opponents so much as to be a take-all-comers type of force.

Actually, the Hunter Orcs on Fell Wargs have about the same, if not less, offensive power than a Hunter Orc on foot. The HOoFW only has extra movement as a complete advantage, with only a roughly 50% chance of having the same number of attacks as a HOof with about the same chance of having double the attacks. However, you HAVE to consider that the HOoFW costs twice as much. So while yes, 1 HOoFW does technically have a good chance of having twice the hitting power as a single HOof, it in no way has anywhere near the same hitting power as 2, which is what you can get for one HOoFW. Of course, if you think they're worth it, then use as many as you like!

Sorry about all the horribly long abbrieviations in there.

_________________
"Leave Sauron to me."
If you're in the Raleigh, NC area, let me know.

On foot, a Hunter Orc has two attacks for two strikes.

Mounted, a Hunter Orc on the charge has two attacks for four strikes (unless I'm missing something completely here) against infantry. That looks like twice the offensive output to me. Now, it's entirely possible that I'm missing something, but since the model is knocked down and as such trapped, strikes are doubled, no?

1. You are missing the fact that the HOof is 1/2 the price, so you would have to 1/2 the effectiveness of the HOoFW when you compare them.

2. The HOoFW only has 2 attacks and 4 strikes, when it charges. If it doesn't charge, only 1 attack and 1 strike.

So when you charge, it is just as likely to win as 1 hunter orc, but twice as likely to wound. BUT if it doesn't charge, then it has half the chance to win and to wound. But, because of it's price, you have to compare it to 2 HOof, in which case you have 1/2 the chance to win (when charging) or only 1/4 the chance to win (when you get charged). So, their only real advantage is that they can move much faster, but that really isn't worth 8 pts IMO.

_________________
"Leave Sauron to me."
If you're in the Raleigh, NC area, let me know.

Except that a direct points-per-points comparison never works out for a more expensive unit. With such a comparison, we might all say that (for example) the Goblin King is a terrible unit because you can take 30 Goblins for the same cost, which will give you ten times the attacks and ten times the wounds, etc.

In a direct-points comparison, the cheapest unit (nearly) always wins. However, the Mounted Hunter has two particular bonuses that aren't being taken into account: the ability to concentrate offense into a single model and the ability to count as a single model for warband creation.

In the case of my particular warband, if I were to dispense with the Mounted Hunters, I would have 48 more points--enough for a Fell Orc Captain leading absolutely nobody.



Which is why it's vitally important to dictate the terms of engagement with Cavalry models. Luckily, I have a character with 3 Might hanging around with them and a bunch of other threats, plus a nice fast Movement to ensure I can engage on my terms, not on my opponent's.



And this is why straight points comparisons don't work. If they did, we'd all be playing nothing but Goblins and the Shire with the least expensive Heros we could find.

OK, but you can take a normal wargrider with exactly the same power but for 4 points more, you can say:
I've got a special rule to charch without line of sight.
but is that worth 4 points???

Azog

The points differential is noticeable, agreed. It's also largely spent on things that only matter if the Warg gets shot out from under the Hunter Orc, but that's defintely a possibility.

Ultimately, I'll agree that Warg Riders are a superior choice in most cases. However, I'm not trying to take an Isengard force (and to be fair, I thought the OT Wargs looked ridiculous).

I use hunter orcs on fellwargs... you cannot stats hammer them vs hunter orcs fairly as they are not comparable. Its like comparing warg riders to orcs... you dont expect them to do the same job the same way.

Hunter orc on fell warg - amazing counter attacking force. Great for charing around corners (which btw has happened alot because I deploy them to take advantage of this rule, remember SBG tables should be 30-50% scenary). Knocking over models when charging or removing the charge bonus when counter charging cavalry. Major advantage is that when they lose their mount the rider is still very effective unlike basic orcs.
Hunter orc on foot - great elite troop, a bit low D but S4 and A2 is really handy.

Neither works well on their own, neither is great value for points on their own but its how you use them.

To make the HOoFW more effective, take an orc with horn (and bow) on foot and hide him somewhere. C3 means the warg is more likely to stick around. It also makes your heroes more potent when/if you break.

Compared to a standard warg rider... fell warg is much better. Charge around corners + more attacks if dismounted + higher strenght if dismounted means a much better over all warrior.

Natures wrath normally nukes warg riders, but with fellwargs you laugh take your C3 tests (thanks to the horn) and then make trouble with HOs and FWs

I disagree with you Mr Cereal Thief. A Hunter Orc on Fell Warg is worth more 1pt more than a Warg Rider only. And there are no corners for movement, you can move around a building.

A Warg Rider is better value than a Hunter Orc on Fell Warg. The purpose of cavalry is to be mounted, not for the Warg to die.

Let me explain why 2-handed weapons are better than you think. Yes they have a penalty to win, but they are not in a vacuum. 1) You can send 2 hunter orcs to 1 man and only one of them should be 2-handed. I'm not suggesting you take a warband of 12 2-handers. 2) You can now support them with spears and teh spaer support doesn't have the penalty.

Mounted archers are not worth it when yourshoot value os terrible. Hunter Orcs, whether on foot or mounted are used for attack.

Also, you can compare a Hunter Orc on foot with a mtd one. Infantry can be sped up with a heroic march or drummer. Infantry and cavalry can be compared, their pts are worked out on th esame base line. You cannot however compare a hero and/or monster with a regular warrior because the stats are worked out differently.

And any army has access to horns. You just ally one in.

_________________
"I am the Flying Spagetti Monster. Thou shall have no other monsters before me"
-FSM.

You miss my point. Alot of terrain blocks line of sight. Having a 10 inch moving cavalry that can charge around such a terrain piece into your opponent is very valuable especially as if you lost priority they cannot charge you because they cannot see you.

Also with the drum/heroic march. Smeh. Drum n heroic march are kinda over rated seeing as only in 2 missions do you have any distance between you and your opponent. Also you can't charge but a HOoFW.
Its not just movement it is the charging bonus. As for the wargs riders are better than HOoFW I disagree not just because of being able to charge what I cant see. The "what if" scenario of the warg dying or your dudes being dismounted by a blast or natures wrath... or brutal power attack:Hurl is a real threat. Your warg rider once dismounted is pathetic. A hunter orc is still an ok fighting unit.

I also dont buy the idea that you can compare them just because of base line stat. The felwarg increases in potency when he has an orc on top. Fell wargs are better than wargs. So though the Orc hunter doesn't gain loads the warg does.

Its all down to what else you field and what you want them to do.
I use a horde of goblins, the trolls and 5 HOoFW with fimbul on a FW.
The orcs are counter attackers or shock troops most of the time but if I see a building in a prominent place I hug hte side of hte building and suddenly charge around. This tactic has caught a fair few people with their pants down.

Yes they are over priced but only by 1pt in my opinion.
Charge without line of sight is vs gd
Better chances if dismounted by the enemy also useful

P.S. the bow is merely because a horn needs to be out of the way but therefore is a waste of points unless you give htem a bow to get involved from far away.

I know a Hunter Orc is better tah a Warg Rider, but not that much.

It should definately be 2pts not 1pt. All those pts for 2 special rules, one which only works should the mount die, and one that only works if the board has enough terraign. The pts of cavalry should not really include how well they are on foot. If that was the case the Mahud Raider would have to drop considerably in pts. Same with Chariots.

But why one eath would you spend twice the pts for an archer just for 2" of movement or as guards for a model that could also be on foot.

Even if your board is crammed with terraign a mounted Hunter Orc is still overpriced.

Having said all that, I don't have aproblem with fielding them as long as they don't have bows. The models are cool, they aren't too bad, and you can always make up for it by including troops who can actually earn their pts.

If however you like the models but don;t want to risk it you could always use them to represent Mordor/Isengard/Angmar Warg Riders. And Perhaps Fimbul as Sharku, and if you are really lucky with opponants and odd enough to do it Azog as Gothmog.

_________________
"I am the Flying Spagetti Monster. Thou shall have no other monsters before me"
-FSM.